99. Christopher Nolan’s Mementos
Posted on December 30th, 2013
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5 Responses to “99. Christopher Nolan’s Mementos”
I’ve been a follower of your site for a long time, however this write-up
Christopher Nolan’s Mementos | Steven Benedict is the most effective.
Many thanks for your kind words. But I reckon that with each new film Nolan makes, I’m going to have to constantly update it!
Hey Steven, curious to hear your thoughts on Interstellar. It’s a progression of his worldview and probably the most like Waterland. Would love to hear what you have to say.
Hi Zach,
Thanks for getting in touch. I found Interstellar more and yet less than I had hoped. But I think the big question is where does Nolan go next. He has just delivered the biggest themes possible (existence and mortality) on the biggest canvas possible (time and the cosmos). So, where does he go to from here? He may be filling a little bit like Kubrick may have done after he delivered 2001.
Have you analyzed the meta aspects of his films? A thorough line can be found in The Prestige, Inception, and Interstellar. Each works as a parallel to a filmmaker going off to create films and leave his family. Progressively the children get older in his films and his daughter is even in Interstellar. With Inception I’d theorized that Nolan was purging himself of his female/wife character that had plagued his heroes (It’s a film entirely about itself). The final shot showed that his next original film would be about his children, and it was. And really, I found Interstellar to be the most intimate and personal thing he’s ever made. So following this meta thread we had Cooper being the first Nolan protagonist to be free, happy and saying goodbye to his family. As you said with Nolan’s cities being a maze headspace, I think his filmography is a personal labyrinth of connected characters. Inception is that ultimate city maze and he finally escapes it at the end. In Interstellar we find a man living outside of the city WITH his two children. My guess is that his next film will be something more adventurous and possibly feature a younger protagonist because isn’t that what Cooper is about to go do? I expect something Back to the Future or Raiders of the Lost ark esque.